3dsmax 2015 frustrations

[Syclone1]

I have two major problems with max2015 that are really getting my goat.

First off it seems that every time I open a file I have to type "fileoutgamma=2.2" into the listener otherwise the gamma is coming out at 1.0 no matter what I do. even when opening files that the output gamma is 1.0 and the system is 2.2, when asked even if I tell it to use the system gamma at 2.2 it still does not maintain the proper gamma.

Secondly when saving to 32bit TGA files, if I open them up in photoshop it says they are 8bit, Im seriously scratching my head at this as Ive run a couple tests on 3 different scenes/projects and although I can clearly see the 32bit option is selected it opens as 8bit in PS.

Any help/insight would be greatly appreciated,

-dave

[pokoy]

Secondly when saving to 32bit TGA files, if I open them up in photoshop it says they are 8bit, Im seriously scratching my head at this as Ive run a couple tests on 3 different scenes/projects and although I can clearly see the 32bit option is selected it opens as 8bit in PS.

I believe for TGAs this means it's 8 bits per channel (RGB+Alpha > 4 x 8bpc=32bits), not 32 bits per channel like in TIF and EXR formats.

[Syclone1]

Ah ok that might make more sense, can anyone else confirm this?

**EDIT**
After doing some digging the *32bit TGA is a little misleading where its like it was stated by Pokoy. Now with that mystery solved can anyone shed light on the GAMMA issue with 2015? Ive only made the jump from 2014 to 2015 in the last week and already thankful I didn't jump on the 2015 bandwagon when it was released lol.

I believe for TGAs this means it's 8 bits per channel (RGB+Alpha > 4 x 8bpc=32bits), not 32 bits per channel like in TIF and EXR formats.

[DanielBrew]

I'm on 2016 but I have a file called CurrentDefaults.ini which has the line OutputGamma=1.000000:

C:\Users\UserName\AppData\Local\Autodesk\3dsMax\2016 - 64bit\ENU\en-US\defaults\MAX.vray\CurrentDefaults.ini

Maybe worth a look..

[Syclone1]

Ill Check it out, thanks Daniel!

[Donald2B]

From what I have gathered...the output gamma is like a toggle. Once set to 1.0 or 2.2 it will stay that way until changed. So I made sure that my maxstart.max file was setup with outputgamma = 2.2 and that anytime I open an older file with set to 1.0 I choose the option to keep the system file gamma. That should allow the setting to "stick". It's also nice that when I reset max, if I get that message I know that the file that I was just working in wasn't setup properly and I can quickly go back in and change it.

If you want to check the gamma on currently open scene, type: "fileOutgamma" (without quotes) into the maxscript window and it will return either 1.0 or 2.2.
To change that value just enter the following into the maxscript window: fileOutgamma = 1.0 -or- fileOutgamma = 2.2

This should easily allow you to make the appropriate adjustments to the output gamma without having to dig for ini files.

I hope this helps some.

[Morne]

Also, you can do a pre-render script that sets the gamma correctly, that way it should always render like you expect